In the 1920s, Coco Chanel changed the course of women's fashion forever when she abandoned her frilly corsets and petticoats and raided the oh-so-English closet of her lover, Étienne Balsan. Her scandalously gamine wardrobe of men's blazers, jodhpurs and tweed waistcoats was the germ of the suits made of jersey—previously the stuff of fishermen's underwear—that built her empire.